Sitecore + SalesForce – Connecting Sitecore Contacts with SalesForce Contacts

Dear All,

This post is in continuation of the previous ones

We saw how easy it is to setup a connection between Sitecore and SalesForce and in case we have any issues with connection, how easy it is to troubleshoot and fix it. But, till we have mapping between the contacts of Sitecore and SalesForce, the synchronization that is setup will not be of complete use.

So what extra steps are required?

Well, its simple, as for a Database, we require Primary Key to identify a row in the table, we need a Primary Key between Sitecore and Salesforce as well. As this contact is which is created in Sitecore and going to SalesForce – we can say its the Sitecore ID – which is basically the Sitecore Contact GUID.

As our Sitecore Contact already has the Sitecore GUID, we need to do the following two things:

Make sure there is a field in SalesForce, which maps to the Sitecore GUID
Enable the Sitecore ID field in Data Exchange SalesForce Tenant

So lets get started with the first step!

Login to your SalesForce Account.
Next, in the top right corner, click on the Gear icon and selected Setup

Now, in the left side Pane, click on Objects and Fields > Object Manager. Click on it. (You can also type Object Manager in the quick find search bar)

Now, in the Object Manager, click on Contact

Here, in the left side pane, click on Fields and Relationships

Here, we will notice all the fields of the Contact Object. Now, we want to create a Custom field. for that, On the right side, click on the New Button.

Select Text type of field and click next.

Here, we will give the Field Label, its length and Field Name as these are required field properties. Along with these, as this field is going to come from Sitecore, its basically an external field, so we need to check External ID as well. From the best practices perspective, its good to also give Description and Help text as it will in a way help us or someone else working on our SalesForce account in future. So lets do it. Once done, click Next.

We dont need to select anything, the next screen, so we will just click next and in the step after that, click Save. Now, when we get back to the Fields and Relationships screen, we will see that our Sitecore Id Field appears there.

Alright, so the first step is taken care of, now lets continue with the second step.

Login to Sitecore and open the Content Editor.
Select the SalesForce Tenant.

Lets go to the location: /sitecore/system/Data Exchange/Salesforce Tenant/Data Access/Value Accessor Sets/Providers/Salesforce/Salesforce Contact Fields/Sitecore Id on Salesforce Contact
In the Administration section, and select the checkbox Enabled.